User:TechAngel85/Sandbox2

Template:Notice -- by the S.T.E.P. Team and Wiki Editors

Updated: 5:06:18 17 January 2013 (UTC)

GUIDE FORUM THREAD

Introduction

Installation & Setup

Sensor Monitoring

Overclocking

Creating a Skyrim Profile

Troubleshooting

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NVIDIA Inspector

NVIDIA Inspector is a tool created by Orbmu2k. This tool provides detailed hardware information much like GPU-Z from all the available hardware senors pertaining to the video card. This senor information can also be monitored via the included monitors which, in turn, can be logged to a CSV file for later viewing. Inspector also provides simple overclocking tools to control the GPU clock, memory clock, shader clock, voltage, and fan speed of the video card; however, not all of these options will be available to all users.

NVIDIA Inspector's real treasure is the Driver Profile Settings (game profiles). Inspector includes over two hundred individual game profiles. Using these profiles you can set up individual driver settings for individual games that will be loaded and used when the game is launched. These settings are also more extensive than the settings included in the NVIDIA Control Panel so you have more control and additional settings to fine tune your games.

This Guide will not be a step-by-step process of what to set your Inspector settings on. That would be impossible to do with the endless combinations of video cards and system hardware. This Guide will; however, break down each of the settings in Inspector so that you may be better informed about what settings may be best for your system.

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NVIDIA Inspector Installation

The wonderful thing about NVIDIA Inspector is that it's a standalone application. There is no installation required. Simply download the tool and run the .exe to launch the program. This means it can also be ran from USB flash drives and used on the go. You can download NVIDIA Inspector here: NVIDIA Inspector

Thank you TechSpot for your wonderful service!

NVIDIA Inspector Overview

Main Screen

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When you open the program this is the first screen you'll see. Here you'll find all your hardware information. You'll also notice two buttons on the upper left side. The first button uploads a screenshot of the app to Techpowerup.org. The second button below that will open your hardware monitors. Further down to the right of the Driver Version box is a button that will open the game profiles plugin for Inspector. Finally, at the bottom there is a banner to allow you do donate, a drop-down box to allow you to switch between multiple GPUs if you're running SLI, and a button that will open the Overclocking pane. Clicking this button will prompt a warning about overclocking, before the pane opens.

Monitors

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Clicking the Sensor Monitoring button will open the this screen. Monitors are discussed on the Sensor Monitoring tab.

Game Profiles

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Clicking the Driver Profile Settings (game profiles) button will open this screen. Game profiles are discussed on the Creating Skyrim Profile tab.

Overclocking Pane

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Clicking on the Show Overclocking button and choosing "Yes" to the prompt will open this overclocking pane. Overclocking is discussed on the Overclocking tab.

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Sensor Monitoring

Sensor monitoring can be very helpful when testing hardware stability, performing overclocks, mod testing, or when testing new settings or changes to those settings. Inspector includes 14 different monitors for this purpose. These include:

• GPU Usage
• VPU Usage
• MCU Usage
• BUS Usage
• Memory Usage
• GPU Clock
• Memory Clock
• Shader Clock
• Voltage
• GPU Temperature
• PCB Temperature
• Fan Level
• Fan Tachometer
• Power Level

Of these, the most useful are going to be determined by what you are using the monitors for.

Customizing the Monitors

To open the monitors, click on the Sensor Monitoring button located on the main screen on the upper left side. Once opened, the monitors are defaulted to stay on top of all other windows. The default monitors displayed are the GPU Usage, GPU Clock, Voltage, and the GPU Temperature. To change the monitors simply right-click on the monitor window and hover over "Monitors". The monitors which have a check beside them will be the monitors displayed. You may check as few as one or all of them, if you desire.

The other settings on the right-click menu are as followed:

GPUs

This allows to you select which GPU you wish to monitor if you're using more than one such as in SLI.

Monitors

Provides a list of all the monitors available.

Antialiased Graphs

Makes the graphs a bit less jagged.

Always on Top

Toggle whether the monitor windows stays on top of other windows or not.

Capture Disabled Monitors

Toggles whether to capture all monitor data or just the monitors you're displaying via the Monitors menu.

Log Active Monitors to CSV

Toggles whether or not to log the active monitors to a CSV file for later viewing.

Reset All Monitors

Resets the monitors to start fresh.

Hide to Tray

Minimizes the monitor window to the system tray.

Close

Closes the monitor window.

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Inspector Overclocking

First a disclaimer: Inspector and STEP can not be held liable for any possible mishaps resulting from overclocking your video card. Potential problems resulting from overclocking can include anything from voiding your warranty to overheating and bricking your card and everything in between. If you decide to overclock your video card, you do so at your own risk. This overclocking overview is meant for information purposes only. Now, on to the magic...

Overclocking in Inspector is not much different than overclocking in other third party software. Keep in mind, depending on your video card model, not all overclocking controls will be at your disposal in Inspector. Inspector was not written with overclocking in mind; therefore, if you need more powerful and precise options you should look elsewhere. It is also a good idea to have monitors open when overclocking so that you may monitor the effect of your changes.

Overclocking Pane

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To open the overclocking pane, click the "Show Overclocking" button at the bottom of the main screen. You'll be prompted with a warning asking if you are aware of the risk with overclocking. Clicking "No" closes the windows. Clicking "Yes" will open the overclocking pane. Clicking the button again will hide the pane. Below is a break-down of the items on this pane:

Fan Control

The first thing you'll probably notice is a large vertical slider. This controls the Fan Speed. By default it is set to "Auto". To manually set the fan speed, uncheck "Auto" and move the slider to the desired position. Then click on "Set Fan" to lock it in. In the screenshot, the fan setting is grayed out because the shot was taken on a laptop with no fan control. Any areas you see in the pane which are grayed out is because you either don't have control of these items through the drivers or because Inspector can not control these items on your video card model.

Performance Level

This is a drop-down menu that allows you to select which performance level the NVIDIA drivers use. The performance level is normally changed dynamically by the drivers depending on the GPU load. The main levels are P0, P8, and P12; though yours may differ depending on model. P0 is for high loads such as video gaming, P8 is for loads similar to video acceleration, and P12 is an idle load; when the video card isn't really doing anything. If you have different values, remember that the lower values are higher performance requirements and the higher values are for lower performance requirements.

Unlock Min & Unlock Max

The frequencies available to you by default are locked in via the NVIDIA drivers. Clicking "Unlock Min" or "Unlock Max" will removed these driver limitation so that you may overclock to higher frequencies or underclock to lower frequencies. Clicking these buttons again will relock the frequencies to the driver limitations.

GPU Clock

The GPU clock normally stays grayed out and is provided for informational purposes. This clock can be changed but not individually with Inspector. It is changed by changing the Shader Clock and always remains half the frequency of the Shader Clock. For example, if your Shader Clock is set to 1600MHz then your GPU Clock will be set to 800MHz.

Memory Clock

Measured in megahertz, this changes the frequency of the VRAM. The buttons below the sliders allows for fine tuning of the frequency for both clocks.

Shader Clock

Also measured in megahertz, like the Memory Clock, this changes the frequency of the Shader Clock.

Voltage

Here it is possible to change the voltage to which the video card receives.

Create Clocks Shortcut

This is where Inspector shines! Clicking this button will save a shortcut on your desktop to specific clock settings. These means it's possible to have different overclocks for different game profiles or other tasks. Double clicking on one of these shortcuts will adjust your clocks to the preset settings automatically so you don't have to open Inspector and do it manually every time. So if you want a 10% overclock while you're video encoding, a 25% overclock while gaming, and default settings the rest of the time, all you'd have to do is make three Clock Shortcuts and double-click the appropriate shortcut anytime you change between tasks. Easy and brilliant! One of these preset can also be loaded at system start-up by simply placing the shortcut in your Startup folder in your Windows Start Menu.

Apply Defauts

This reverts any changes to the clock back to their driver defaults.

Apply Clocks & Voltage

This applies the clock and voltage settings immediately.

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Driver Profile Settings

Driver Profile Settings or game profiles can be opened from the main screen by click the Driver Profile Settings button located to the right of the Driver Version box.

FEATURES DESCRIPTION (and FPS HIT)

Supersampling: 2x (FPS hit ~2-4)

• SS 2x is very performance friendly, but if you want an even better SS, try 4x/8x SS or 4x/8x Sparse-Grid SS (both are BIG fps killers). WARNING: Sparse-Grid SS may cause semi-transparent NPC/player/mobs glitch! Turn it off if you experience this issue in-game.

Anisotropic Filter: 16x (FPS hit ~1-2)

• Forcing AF 16x from your video card settings improves water rendering, even if the game already uses AF 16x. Be sure to set AF to 0 using the Skyrim Launcher when forcing it (revisit
• 1.D.2. SkyrimPrefs INI ).

WARNING: SSAO set to "Quality" or "High Quality" have a HUGE impact on performance!

IMPORTANT NOTES

− In NVIDIA Inspector, search for "Elder Scrolls: Skyrim". If you cannot find it, update your NVIDIA drivers to the latest version. − Make sure Transparency Multisampling is disabled. It has been reported that this can make Khajiit and other creatures appear semi-transparent.

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IMPORTANT: Some NVIDIA cards (like the GTX 560 Ti) ceased rendering SSAO outdoors in Skyrim after the official 1.5.24 patch. The problem hasn’t been resolved but NVIDIA is aware of it. For now, you can temporarily switch to Oblivion or Fallout 3 compatibility to get back the SSAO outdoors.